Grain Free Too Soon--help with food???

So, I read a link to the forum about switching to grain free too soon. So, at 8 weeks, I believe Freya has been switched too soon. Before, the breeder had her on Diamond Small Puppy food which only had whole grain brown rice and barley. I switched her to Avoderm Chicken and Rice for puppies which also had rice in it and I believe it is its only carb product.

My question is, should I switch foods? I don't want her to have any growth problems cause she didn't have enough carbs in her diet. The reason why I have her on Avoderm is because our Weim is allergic to a fair amount of products in dog foods so we had to put him on that. We will soon switch him to Nature's Recipe Lamb and Rice and I may switch Freya to that as well but the puppy formula.

What kind of food should I feed Freya? I was looking into Blue Buffalo puppy formula. I'm so confused now.

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Permalink Reply by Corgibyassociation on January 7, 2009 at 8:31am

Zomg! I was about to give myself a headache after all the research I did last night. We want to switch because of the gas--I'm in a house with two dogs and a man with gas. Cloud, our weim, has it the worst.

Then I started reading about varying the proteins for your puppy and discovered that Nature's Recipe had a very small amount of protein comparatively.

As for Freya, she likes the lamb and rice Avoderm better than the chicken and rice. So I put a little bit of Cloud's food in hers just to get her to eat it. If she's free (I put her in her sleeping box to eat), she will eat all of Cloud's food and he will just stand there and watch her. Also, is it normal for her to be so itchy? I haven't found a flea on her yet. My vet put her on Advantage Multi--but god she is so itchy.

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Permalink Reply by Jessica on January 6, 2009 at 5:24pm

www.dogfoodanalysis.com is a great website. It teaches you how to read labels and what to look for as well as ratings. My little one was on Diamond too when I first got him. I switched him to Wellness Puppy (I highly recommend it) when he was 13-14 weeks old because he had very watery eyes and I suspected that he had an allergy to it. His problem cleared up in about two weeks after switching.

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Permalink Reply by Corgibyassociation on January 7, 2009 at 8:46am

Oh, I love that website! That's where I discovered that--I think Nature's Recipe didn't have enough meat in their meal. It is cheaper too, which doesn't mean anything and I'm not sure why I even mentioned it. Sigh. \

Need more sleep! Potty training is sapping me like a live wire falling and knocking the power out.

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Permalink Reply by Jessica on January 7, 2009 at 5:23pm

I love the Nature's Recipe training treats(soft ckn flavored)! (Ein does too). You could always just add meat yourself (plain cooked chicken for example), but that might cause her to just eat the meat and not the dog food.

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Permalink Reply by Corgibyassociation on January 8, 2009 at 8:32am

Very true. I know my boyfriend sometimes feed our Weim raw. Mainly cause it's cheaper but also cause his family has done this with their Weims. I'm not so sure about it--touching raw meat kind of creeps me out. But I also worry about the germs and how they would spread around cause of them eating it raw like that.

I'll have to go look for that training treat. Did you try that chicken treat? I try all the treats that I buy for the dogs. Grant it, I buy organic stuff and that's the only reason why I try them. :D

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Permalink Reply by Corgibyassociation on January 8, 2009 at 8:35am

Sadness, I've been thinking about dog food so much that I dreamt about it!

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Permalink Reply by Kelly on January 8, 2009 at 10:04am

If it has rice in it, it's not grain free....so I wouldn't worry!! :)

Just feed something healthy that is convenient for you to buy.

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Permalink Reply by Corgibyassociation on January 8, 2009 at 11:04am

I think I'm going to try Blue Buffalo. :D Lamb and rice. She doesn't seem too crazy over the Avoderm Chicken and rice cause she will wolf the Lamb and rice our Weim eats.